


vanish with the sunrise spark

by dulceit



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Humor, M/M, Swearing, pls tell me if you find the unnamed sehun cameo, very minor violence/action
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-10
Updated: 2017-06-10
Packaged: 2018-11-04 07:48:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,431
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10986591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dulceit/pseuds/dulceit
Summary: Supernatural hunters Jongdae and Baekhyun get hired to remove the ghost that’s been haunting a new apartment complex. It’s not as simple as it sounds.





	vanish with the sunrise spark

**Author's Note:**

> (originally written for [exomonsterfest](http://exomonsterfest.livejournal.com/2086.html))

Wolf boy is a sprinter. Jongdae takes a flying leap over the escalator division and hits the ground running, cool air whipping through his hair as he attempts to keep their target’s furry maroon hide in his sights. Baekhyun hurtles along in his peripheral as an unfocused smudge of black hair.

Werewolves in general are a pain in the ass to hunt down—too fast to catch when a wolf, too easy to lose when a human. Jongdae’s banking on this asshole sticking with his more conspicuous wolf form, though, because fast or not he’ll be impossible to find as a human among the throng of noisy shoppers. 

Said shoppers have taken to milling around in confusion at the sight of the overgrown red mutt skittering along the polished mall floors, which means they’re being loud and in the way and overall nonconductive to a hunt. Jongdae jostles past a group of foreign tourists—they cluck at him admonishingly, stumbling away—and can practically feel this month’s paycheck slipping out of his poor, impoverished fingers.

Baekhyun is apparently thinking the same thing, because a second later he cups two hands around his mouth and yells, “SUPERNATURAL FBI, STAY CLEAR, ASSHATS!” 

“Oh my god,” Jongdae groans, but it gets the job done: the confused fools clutching expensive shopping bags to their chests look no less confused but do press back to give them a wide berth, effectively clearing an open path. Baekhyun shoots him a satisfied grin. Wolf boy throws a panicked look over his shoulder and ups his unfairly-four-pawed pace.

They finally catch up to him in the glitzy lobby of the mall’s Nordstrom. Jongdae vaults over a display of gold watches and slams into him feet-first. There are cries of alarm from the surrounding crowd as he grapples messily with the writhing wolf, trying to avoid the snapping jaws, and ultimately gets thrown off into a stack of shoe boxes that promptly topple under his weight. Wolf Asshole looks around wildly at the ring of anxious spectators and seems to come to the realization that confrontation is the only escape option left. He whirls with a snarl, bunches his muscles in preparation to leap at Jongdae, and—

 _BANG,_ Baekhyun beats him to it. The werewolf keels over soundlessly, tranquilizer shot poking jauntily out of the side of his neck. “What a piece of shit,” Baekhyun says cheerfully, a little out of breath, one hand sliding his shotgun back into the holster at the small of his back. “Fast, too.”

“Couldn’t you have done that earlier?” Jongdae groans from the pile of shoeboxes. “Fuck. Ow. Maybe before he threw me into a wall of high heels?”

“Don’t be an infant,” Baekhyun replies breezily, as if he isn’t the smaller and more infantile of the two. He comes over to offer a hand. “It was a necessary part of my master plan. The needs of the many outweigh the n—”

Jongdae grabs the offered hand and heaves. Baekhyun yelps and looses his balance mid-nerdy Star Trek reference, sprawling forward onto Jongdae in a painful collision of elbows and knees. They bat at each other fruitlessly on the ground for a few seconds too long until someone clears their throat.

Both of them freeze. 

“Ah, shit,” Baekhyun murmurs, scrambling to his feet. He offers a hand again and this time Jongdae accepts it with a guilty grimace. (Baekhyun tugs with more force than necessary and snickers when Jongdae stumbles.)

The police officer standing at the mouth of the Nordstrom clears his throat again and looks down at the prone werewolf, then at them, suspiciously. “You boys hunters?”

They mumble in assent. 

“Can I see an ID, son?”

“We’re not teenagers, jesus,” Baekhyun mutters under his breath, and Jongdae silently agrees even as he fumbles for his card. 

Dad-cop squints at both of their IDs for a few seconds. “Both twenty-four years old,” he grumbles. “I’ve got kids older than you two.” He holds a hand out, not looking up. “Hunting license, son?”

Baekhyun looks sufficiently chastised when he hands it over. Dad-cop flips their licenses around for a few beats too before finally returning the cards. 

He looks at Jongdae, apparently (and very rightly) deciding he’s the saner of the two. “Listen, we appreciate the work you boys are doing in hunting down these supernatural, but this is the second time this week we’ve gotten calls for collateral damage from you people. Try to tone it down, all right?”

“Yes, sir,” they mumble, and ten minutes later they’re on the road with no hassle and an unconscious werewolf in the trunk. 

 

 

 

 

 

The man who called them in to deal with his werewolf problem—some rich fool named Yixing who runs the mall’s management—thanks them profusely over the phone and routes a hefty amount of money to their account despite the Nordstrom Incident.

Baekhyun grins and leans over the console to sling an arm around Jongdae, pulling him close while looking down at their bank account on his phone. “We won’t need to work for, like, a whole month with this kind of money,” he preens.

Jongdae attempts to keep driving in a straight line. “Of course doing nothing for a month appeals to you,” he snorts, hands going white-knuckled on the steering wheel despite the smile tugging at his lips. “You’ll still have to do shit like wash dishes and cook, mind you.”

“Of course,” Baekhyun singsongs, smushing their cheeks together. Jongdae squawks and tries to struggle free of his hold, but Baekhyun clings on like a leech, continuing to croon greasy nothings. His breath crests warm and familiar over Jongdae’s cheek.

They manage to pull into their apartment’s front lot without major accident. Baekhyun unloads their unused equipment from the back of the car (Wolf boy’s been dropped off at the hunting association’s headquarters) and drags it up a flight of stairs while Jongdae darts ahead to unlock the door. 

“Why did we bring so much,” Baekhyun groans, after he’s dumped the box of equipment on the doorstep. Jongdae rolls his eyes and bends to pull it in the rest of the way. “All we used was one gun.”

“Because we barely ever get called up and we were hoping we would be able to use our equipment for _something,_ ” Jongdae says brusquely. He locks the door and kick-punts the heavy box into the living room. Baekhyun whines but follows without argument. 

As soon as they’ve put everything away Jongdae makes a beeline for the bathroom. “I’m showering first!” he yells over his shoulder, and shuts the door before Baekhyun can protest.

This job has been a blessedly easy one. It still hasn’t left him—either of them, probably—unscathed, though, and as Jongdae steps under the warm shower he grimaces at the bruise blossoming on his hip. Being a supernatural hunter isn’t the wisest or safest occupation to go into, but it pays well when you can actually find work, and Jongdae has his personal reasons for doing it. He suspects Baekhyun has his own, too, but despite four years of collaboration they’ve never spilled that particular detail to each other. 

He and Baekhyun don’t make a bad team, Jongdae thinks offhandedly as he rinses shampoo out of his hair. They dick around a lot and they’ve been told on more than one occasion that it's a miracle they get anything done, but they get there in the end and that’s all that really matters. They would probably be successful enough to regularly earn the amount of money Yixing gave them today if it weren’t for the fact that they work in the same area that Minseok and Luhan work in. Those two assholes are the best in the region and bag jobs left and right.

“You’ve been in there for ages, dicksmudge!” Baekhyun yells through the door, and Jongdae almost drops the soap in surprise.

“Fuck off!” he returns loudly. A second later the door bangs open and Baekhyun shoulders his way in. Jongdae gives him the finger and turns the water off to towel his hair. “You couldn't have waited?”

“Nope, gotta pee,” Baekhyun says. He tosses Jongdae a pile of fresh clothes. “Also, you forgot to bring something to change into.”

Jongdae blinks down at the clothes, oddly touched. “Thanks—”

Baekhyun waves him off. “Yeah, yeah. Now beat it, I need to piss.”

 

 

 

 

 

They get a call from the supernatural hunting association early next morning. Jongdae fumbles with his cellphone for a few seconds before he manages to rest it against the side of his face and mumble a tired “h’llo?”

Junmyeon sounds disapproving. “It’s seven o’clock, did you just wake up?”

“What d’you want?” Jongdae gripes. “We had a job yesterday.”

“Yes, I’m very aware. That’s what I called you for, actually."

Jongdae slides out of bed reluctantly. “Okay,” he grumbles, slouching into the kitchen. 

“Yesterday you and Baekhyun caught a werewolf in the Lotto Mall,” Junmyeon says, and waits for Jongdae to hum in acknowledgement. “Today the man that hired you for it called us and put in a special job request.”

Jongdae stops in the middle of taking the carton of eggs out of the fridge. “For us? A request for _us?_ ”

“Yes, and he refuses the help of any other hunters in the association. Just asks about the two who chased the wolf around his mall.” Junmyeon sounds mildly frustrated. “We would appreciate if you and Baekhyun would come in to look at the case.”

 _Appreciate_ is probably Junmyeon code for _come in or face the consequences_. Jongdae makes a sad face down at the four eggs he’s cracked into a bowl. “We’ll be there in a few hours,” he relents. 

“Thank you,” Junmyeon sighs. “Please don’t harass the gatekeeper this time.”

Baekhyun traipses into the kitchen after he hangs up. “What happened?” he asks blearily. “Why are you up so early?”

“Junmyeon called. That Yixing guy wants to hire us for another job,” Jongdae shrugs. Baekhyun shuffles over to beat the eggs and he surrenders the whisk. “He probably called the association since we didn’t leave our number with him. I told Junmyeon we’d be there around noon.”

“Ughgg,” is all Baekhyun says, and then, “Pass me the pan.”

They scarf down a plate of Baekhyun’s scrambled eggs once he’s finished and then get dressed within the hour. It’s unusually chilly for this time of the year, so Jongdae sticks his cold hands into the warm areas under Baekhyun’s arms as often as possible, earning him stink eyes and a distinctly unthreatening “I’ll cut your icy hands off, asshole”. 

 

 

 

 

 

Zhang Yixing has a supernatural problem, is rich, and, as it turns out, also has a nice as shit personality. Which means they both are swayed into helping him almost immediately despite the fragrant possibility of a month of no work.

“I really appreciate this,” Yixing says. He folds his hands in his lap carefully. “I was hoping the ghost would just leave the complex on his own within a few days, but he hasn’t left his haunting spot ever since we built the apartments.”

“Don't worry, Mr. Zhang, we’ll take care of it,” Jongdae assures him, flashing a wide smile. Yixing returns it relievedly. 

“I know I just called you yesterday, so I wanted to let you know that this is less urgent. You can take your time with it. The apartments aren’t scheduled to open until next month, anyway.” Yixing slides a business card across the table. “Please, call me if anything comes up.”

Junmyeon corners them in the hallway as soon as Yixing leaves. “Are you sure you two can handle this job? There are other hunters in your area who can take—”

“Chill, gramps,” Baekhyun says easily, shoving his hands into his jacket pockets. “It’s just one spirit, we’ve got it covered. Who do you think we are?” 

“Who you gonna call—” Jongdae starts, grinning. 

“—Ghostbusters!” Baekhyun crows. Junmyeon sighs loudly while they high-five.

“Fine. Okay. I don’t know why I asked. Let us know if you need anything.” He shoos them out with a hand pinching the bridge of his nose. 

Once outside, Baekhyun shuffles his hands together with a shiver. “Ghosts, huh? We haven’t dealt with those in a while." He blows on his fingers. “Fuck, it’s cold.”

Jongdae ducks into the car and starts the ignition, flicking the heat on. Baekhyun slides into the passenger seat with a grateful noise. “Is it the weather that’s making you cold, or the vengeful spirits of dead?” he asks, waggling his eyebrows, and Baekhyun lets out a loud bark of laughter. Jongdae starts to pull out of the parking lot but pauses mid-turn. “Hey, we could go to the apartment complex now, actually,” he offers. “Check it out before heading back.”

Baekhyun chews on his lip, considering. “I guess so.” Behind them, someone honks impatiently. “Okay, okay, yeah, geez. Let’s go.”

 

 

 

 

 

“HOLY FUCK,” Jongdae yells.

“RUN THEM OVER,” Baekhyun screams. The car stutters, jerking indecisively while Jongdae legitimately considers flattening the two assholes standing in front of the complex into asshole paste. His conscience wins over in the end and they skid to a stop at the curb. 

Baekhyun bursts out first. “ _Listen,_ you dildos—”

Minseok and Luhan turn away from the building, insufferably calm. Minseok raises an eyebrow. “Baekhyun, Jongdae,” he greets pleasantly. “What can I do for you two?”

Jongdae is at Baekhyun’s side in a flash, arm slinging around his waist. “You can back the fuck off our job, thanks,” he snaps, imitating Minseok’s condescending tone, and Baekhyun deflates minutely against him. 

“I wasn’t aware removing ghosts was a task belonging to you,” Minseok returns. He tucks his hands into his pockets (pant pockets, not jacket pockets, what a fucking pretentious thing to do) and surveys them loftily. 

Baekhyun sneers. “It is if we’ve been hired by the complex owner to do it.”

“Zhang Yixing, bitch,” Jongdae agrees. Next to Minseok, Luhan stiffens, expression clearing in surprise. 

“Yixing?” he repeats. Everyone twists to look at him. “Did you say Zhang Yixing?”

“Yeah,” Jongdae says uncertainly.

“I knew him in school,” Luhan says slowly. “Real sweet, too nice for his own good.” He turns to Minseok. “Not well versed in the supernatural, though. I wouldn’t be surprised if he did hire these two fools.”

Baekhyun makes a low noise of outrage. Jongdae pats his hip placatingly, sensing the conversation segueing into better waters.

“Really,” Minseok says. His voice suggests he isn’t convinced. He tilts his head, considering, and finally shrugs. “Well, missing out on one job isn’t any skin off our backs. Let’s go.” He strolls off towards one of the expensive Lexus cars parked in the lot without looking back.

Luhan offers a bland “see you around” and follows suit. 

“Fuck, I hate those two,” Baekhyun groans as soon as the two cars have peeled away down the street. He tucks closer to Jongdae and drops his head onto his shoulder. “Minseok’s hair looked like a two-dollar bit from Sleazy Dick Salon,” he adds venomously.

“A chunk of white animal hide,” Jongdae agrees. 

“Probably skinned it off whatever he makes his fur coats out of.”

“I hope he returns it to the wild.” 

Baekhyun turns his face into Jongdae’s neck and laughs, smile curving against his skin as he shakes with suppressed giggles. Jongdae grins, pleased. 

He pulls his arm away from Baekhyun’s waist and loops it around his shoulders instead. “I don’t feel like going in there today anymore,” he admits, squinting up at the building as the laughter leaves his body. “I feel more like getting out of this cold-ass weather and stewing in my hate for those two fuckmunches, actually.”

“That’s the best fucking idea you’ve ever had, Dae,” Baekhyun mumbles into his neck. They start to head back towards the car until Jongdae suddenly sputters loudly. 

“Wait, I’ve definitely had better ideas than this—”

“Nah, your ideas are shit.”

The sounds of them squabbling can be heard through the whole neighborhood. 

 

 

 

 

 

(They end up sitting on the couch and binge-watching some Korean drama, cold feet tangled together under a blanket. Jongdae must fall asleep at some point because he wakes up on the couch next morning with a crick in his neck and the blanket tucked around him snugly.)

 

 

 

 

 

“I’m hungry.”

“Your stomach is like a bottomless pit,” Jongdae grumbles. He opens the door of one apartment unit and peers inside. No ghost. “You just ate breakfast.”

“Hey, I’m a growing adult,” Baekhyun defends from the unit across the hall. “I need food to get taller!”

“That’s not how it works, dipshit," Jongdae calls back. He moves on to the next door. Baekhyun starts crooning the first lines of whatever’s been playing on the radio recently, voice echoing around the empty hall, and Jongdae rolls his eyes skyward before joining in. 

They’re just reaching the bridge when Baekhyun suddenly cuts off. His last note hangs in the air ominously. Jongdae blinks, taking a second to comprehend, then quickly bolts back into the hallway towards the unit Baekhyun is in. 

“Baek—!”

“—ongdae, look, he’s adorable,” Baekhyun exclaims at the same time, one foot out of the door. They both pull up short.

“Christ,” Jongdae says first, stepping back, “you gave me a heart attack. What happened?”

Baekhyun breaks out into a grin. “I found the ghost! He’s cute, I was expecting some grizzly old man like your grandpa.”

“My grandpa is awesome, you dick,” Jongdae says, but he follows Baekhyun back into the room when he beckons excitedly.

Standing in the middle of the kitchen is a young man who can only be around their age. His skin is translucent and his form fuzzy around the edges, and he exudes the kind of sleepy-eyed puppy vibe that really would be kind of adorable if it weren’t for the fact that he’s currently gaping at them in terror.

“Um,” Jongdae starts, and the ghost squawks and promptly vanishes through the wall behind him.

“Ack,” Baekhyun groans. He ducks out of the room and into the next one. “You scared him off!"

“I didn’t do anything!” Jongdae protests, following quickly. “He looked like he thought we were going to stab him even before I opened my mouth.”

They do a quick circle through the apartment and find nothing. “Must’ve been your gross face, then,” Baekhyun snips half-heartedly, lips pursing as he scans the bedroom with quick eyes, and Jongdae ignores him. 

“Why is he so scared of us,” he mutters bemusedly. “Usually it’s—augh, SHIT, ow—”

He’s jammed his toe on a jutting section of the wall. Baekhyun snorts and comes over to where he was standing as Jongdae recoils, hopping around awkwardly as his right foot smarts with pain. 

“Whoa,” Baekhyun says. Jongdae starts to say “whoa indeed, that fucking hurt,” until he blinks away his outrage and realizes that Baekhyun’s squatted down by the base of the wall, head hunched between his shoulders to look closer.

“What,” Jongdae says, and Baekhyun leans back to let him see. The part of the wall he’s looking at is bare, not yet painted over with white, and the exposed wood underneath is an alarming charred color. Without the paint it’s also clear that what Jongdae stubbed his toe on wasn’t at all a lumpy wall but the hinges of sealed door. 

“....Whoa,” he echoes at length. He drops his foot to the ground, pain forgotten.

“I’m, uh, no expert,” Baekhyun says, “but it’s not normal to build your new apartments out of burnt wood, right?"

Jongdae squats down beside him cautiously. “Maybe there used to be something here,” he muses. He prods the area gingerly. “Like, a different building. One that got burned up.”

“Kyungsoo and I’s house.”

They both leap a foot in the air. 

Ghost boy stands behind them, looking on at the burnt wall mournfully. When they scramble up in surprise he seems to startle out of whatever he’s thinking and immediately cringes back again. 

“Oh my god, please don’t kill me.”

Baekhyun’s mouth falls open. “Hey, what? We’re not going to hurt you.”

“You’re already dead, too,” Jongdae points out. When ghosty just wilts at his words instead of laughing he hastily fixes on his friendliest smile and amends, “We wouldn’t hurt you either way, though.”

Ghost boy still doesn’t look very convinced. “Those other guys wanted to kill me.”

“Those other guys are _shitheads_ ,” Baekhyun replies, not missing a beat.

Jongdae nods solemnly. “Not a good example of supernatural hunters at all.”

“The worst.”

“Ugly, too. Did you see that one guy’s hair?”

Ghosty chews on his lip and mumbles something. 

“What?”

“I said,” he repeats, looking determinedly at the floor, "it looked like a dead animal."

There’s a beat of stunned silence, before Baekhyun looks at Jongdae with wide eyes and they burst into laughter. “Oh my god,” Baekhyun wheezes, bracing a shaky hand on Jongdae’s shoulders, “I like you already, kid,” and he doubles over with another cackle.

Jongdae manages to scrape himself together first. He wipes away a few tears (but can’t keep the grin off his face) and starts to push a week-kneed Baekhyun towards the door, beckoning for the ghost to follow. “Oh, man, I think you’ll get along with us just fine, um—”

“Jongin,” Ghost boy supplies. He’s finally cracked a smile. “I’m Jongin.”

“I’m Jongdae, and this fool is Baekhyun,” Jongdae says. “It’s nice to meet you.”

 

 

 

 

 

They learn that Jongin was two years younger than them when he died and that he likes dogs and chicken and boys. He’s exactly the kind of younger kid whose hair you’d want to ruffle and stick flowers in, if he weren’t both incorporeal and annoyingly taller than both of them.

Jongin warms up to them quickly but still seems a little wary. As soon as their conversation reaches a lull he drops the other shoe. “Um,” he says, “if you guys are supernatural hunters then why aren’t you trying to kill me?”

“Well, you’re already dead,” Jongdae points out again, lips twitching. “Minseok and Luhan—the two dicktwits that were outside—know that too. What we do is just remove you from the place you’re haunting.”

“They were just using a more violent way,” Baekhyun explains. He tosses an easy arm around Jongdae. “But that’s not how we work!”

“Then how _do_ you work?”

Baekhyun flaps his free hand in the air. “Well, we, y’know—”

“Find other ways,” Jongdae picks up.

“Like asking ghosts to leave,” Baekhyun says. He beams. “Which is what we’re doing now. Jongin, it would be so, so bomb if you would choose a different haunting spot.”

Jongin’s bottom lip juts out. “No.”

“Damn it.” 

 

 

 

 

 

“I can’t believe you two,” Junmyeon says.

“Okay,” Jongdae says, “in our defense—”

“You accept this nice, high-paying man’s job and fail to mention you don't know how to remove spirits?”

“ _In our defense_ ,” Jongdae presses, “he asked for us specifically!”

“Also, that’s untrue,” Baekhyun adds airily. “We do know how to remove ghosts. How could we have gotten our licenses otherwise? We just _ignore_ that method.”

“In favor of your method of asking them to leave?” Junmyeon groans and buries his face in his hands. “I don’t know what Mr. Zhang sees in you two.”

“Compassion,” Baekhyun sniffs. “Dignity. Hotness. Not being a pair of assholes.”

“If you’re referring to Minseok and Luhan,” Junmyeon starts, exasperated, and Jongdae looks at him incredulously. 

“Are you going to defend those two? They have _no_ redeeming points.” Junmyeon starts to say something and Jongdae huffs. “Don’t say they’re the best hunters in our area. There are plenty of good hunters who aren’t total pricks.”

“Look,” Baekhyun puts in, sobering, “we know it’ll be easier to just send some hunters in to exorcise the place, but Jongin’s a really sweet kid and he’s never hurt anyone. Using equipment and force would be unfair.” He glances at Jongdae. “I think we’ll be able to talk him out of it.”

Junmyeon looks between both of them for a while.

“Fine,” he finally says. “Fine. God knows you two can talk circles around anyone.” He narrows his eyes. “ _However,_ if you don’t have it resolved by the time Mr. Zhang’s apartments open in a month, you’ll face suspension of your hunting licenses.”

“But gramps—”

“No buts.”

 

 

 

 

 

Back at the apartment, Baekhyun prints out a picture of Jongin that he’d taken on his phone and tacks it up on the living room wall alongside a photo of the charred apartment panels. He pins up a piece of red string to connect them.

“So,” he announces, hands settling on his hips. “We have a mystery on our hands. Our clues so far: a ghost boy and a burned apartment. Two fascinating enigmas.”

“That’s the most cliché thing I’ve ever heard you say,” Jongdae mumbles from the couch. “And this red string map is the most cliché thing I’ve ever seen you do.”

“Jongin,” Baekhyun says, ignoring him, “also mentioned a Jungsoo—”

“Kyungsoo.”

“—that’s what I said, who might also be a piece in this puzzle.” Baekhyun scrawls _Kyungsoo_ on a sticky note and tapes it on the wall too. He connects it to the Jongin photo with more string. “I propose we talk to Yixing first.” 

“I concur,” Jongdae sighs, slouching further onto the couch cushions. He feels weirdly tired and zapped of energy. “To clear up the burned apartment piece.”

“Exactly.”

“Do we have to do it today?”

Baekhyun turns away from the wall and a strange fond look crosses his face, soft and easy and making Jongdae’s chest feel suddenly warm. “We can call him tomorrow,” he offers. Jongdae nods tiredly. Baekhyun comes over and drops down onto the couch next to him, nudging him over with his hip and settling into the concave of the vacated space. 

The last thing Jongdae remembers is the smell of his shampoo.

 

 

 

 

 

(This time, he wakes up with his head cushioned in the crook of Baekhyun’s neck and one of Baekhyun’s hands tangled loosely in the material of his shirt.)

 

 

 

 

 

It takes them half an hour the next morning to find the business card Yixing gave them, because Baekhyun was the one who took it and Baekhyun is shit at organization. It’s Jongdae who finally finds it in the pocket of a coat Baekhyun threw in the hamper.

Yixing picks up after two rings. “Hello?”

Jongdae clears his throat. “Hi, this is Kim Jongdae and Byun Baekhyun?” Baekhyun reaches over his shoulder to switch the landline to speakerphone and Jongdae shifts so he can listen.

“Ah, yes! Is everything okay?”

“Yes, everything’s fine,” Jongdae says easily, and Baekhyun smothers a laugh into his palm. “We’ve just run into a few minor inconveniences—like real minor, nothing to worry about—and were hoping to ask you about some things.”

“Of course,” Yixing says easily. If he’s concerned then he’s too polite to show it.

“Was this apartment complex built on new ground?”

Jongdae can practically feel the surprise radiating out of the speakerphone in the pause that follows. He grimaces at Baekhyun, who mouths _too soon, yikes._

“…No,” Yixing answers finally. “That location used to be a residential district. About four years ago a fire caught and burned down many of the houses, so they vacated that area and just left it as an empty lot on the market.”

“And then you and your company bought it?”

“Yes, a few months later.”

“One more thing—” Baekhyun makes a slicing motion across his neck but Jongdae presses on. “Did you use any of the surviving structure to build your apartments?”

“There were certain floor plans and structural things like walls that weren’t burnt too heavily, so yes, we did include those to lower our construction budget,” Yixing says. Jongdae widens his eyes meaningfully at Baekhyun. “Did…something happen?”

“No, Mr. Zhang, everything’s fine. This really helped. Thanks for your time!”

Baekhyun wrinkles his nose once he’s hung up. “You sounded shady as hell.”

“It was a necessary part of my master plan,” Jongdae intones, lowering his voice to imitate Baekhyun’s throatier one. “Don’t be an infant. The needs of the many outweigh the needs—”

Baekhyun shoves him off the chair with an indignant squawk. Jongdae falls with a loud cackle.

 

 

 

 

 

The next thing they do is drive to Yixing’s apartments again.

Jongin is loitering the unit they found him in last time, sticking his translucent hands in and out of a patch of sunlight coming through the window and watching the way the light passes through his skin. He jumps and looks up when they walk in.

“I’m not leaving,” he says immediately, mouth taking on the same stubborn jut from before.

“You don’t have to,” Jongdae replies placatingly. “But at least tell us about Kyungsoo.”

There’s a second of silence. Jongdae glances at Baekhyun out of the corner of his eye and sees that he’s doing what looks like a horrible silent impression of Mads Mikkelson in Casino Royale, finger-on-the-temple and all. He almost bursts into laughter right there but he thinks it’ll probably ruin the intimidating look Baekhyun’s going for.

“Dunno who you’re talking about,” Jongin finally sniffs, and he vanishes into the ground beneath them.

“Hhhhh,” Baekhyun groans. He drops his hand down. “This is never gonna work.”

Jongdae sticks his own hands into his pockets with a long sigh. “We’ll get there.”

 

 

 

 

 

The Jongin part of their string-map ends up dragging out over the course of several days.

In the face of Jongin’s stubbornness and obvious reluctance to breach the topic of leaving or Kyungsoo, Jongdae comes up with a truly genius plan of gaining his trust slowly instead. They take turns dropping by the apartments with things like chess boards and stories and even a dog, at one point—Baekhyun has to wheedle the gatekeeper at the association headquarters into letting them borrow his tiny white Bichon Frise, and it’s worth seeing Jongin light up and coo at the uninterested dog—and gradually Jongin seems to take to them as much as they have to him.

On the sixth afternoon, Jongin says, “Kyungsoo and I were like you and Baekhyun.”

Jongdae, in the middle of moving his rook to B4, stills in surprise. “What?”

Jongin fidgets. “He meant a lot to me. I—” He blows out a shaky breath. “I really, really loved him.”

“What,” Jongdae repeats. 

“I mean—you and Baekhyun?” Jongin says, voice trailing a little in uncertainty. “Kyungsoo and I were like that. That’s who he was. Is. I don’t know what happened to him after the fire.” He fidgets again. “And I’m not leaving until I find out.”

“Oh.” Jongdae blinks. “ _Oh._ Baekhyun and I aren’t—we aren’t—”

Now it’s Jongin’s turn to blink. After a second, his eyes grow comically wide. “Wait, what? You aren’t dating?”

“No? Holy shit, why would you think that.”

“Wow,” is all Jongin says. “That’s the saddest thing I’ve ever heard.” He looks genuinely boggled.

“What does _that_ mean,” Jongdae sputters.

“I mean,” Jongin says hastily, “I just assumed you were boyfriends, since you and Baekhyun live together and you have that life-partners vibe—” Jongdae makes a weird strangled noise, “—and you’re kind of, you know—” Jongin gestures vaguely and Jongdae makes another, more strangled noise, “—intimate? With each other?”

When Jongdae just gawks at him, Jongin droops a little. “Sorry for jumping to conclusions.”

“No, it’s…okay,” Jongdae finally manages. He’s barely hearing himself and he wonders distantly if this is a weird fever dream. “It’s fine. Don’t worry about it.”

 

 

 

 

 

When Jongdae gets back at their flat later that day, he tells Baekhyun that Kyungsoo was Jongin’s boyfriend. Baekhyun grabs him by the lapels of his coat, tugging him closer, and hisses “fuck, _really_?”, and Jongdae’s mind flashes immediately to Jongin’s words earlier about being intimate.

Oh no, he thinks distantly.

 

 

 

 

 

On the seventh afternoon, Chanyeol stops by at their flat.

He shows up in the kitchen at four unannounced, a rifle toted over one shoulder and his stomach growling like a werewolf. He grins apologetically when Jongdae squints at him from the countertop.

“We gave you that key for _emergencies,_ not for barging in whenever you need a pit stop.”

“I happened to be in the area and I’m hungry,” Chanyeol shrugs. He takes off his snapback and Jongdae notices his hair is back to a dull brown. “Baekhyun makes the best scrambled eggs.”

Right on cue, the toilet flushes and Baekhyun emerges from the bathroom. He stops and blinks. 

“He wants your scrambled eggs,” Jongdae supplies. 

“It’s four in the afternoon,” Baekhyun says incredulously. “Who the fuck craves scrambled eggs in the afternoon?”

“This asshole right here,” Chanyeol grins, swiping out a long arm to loop around Baekhyun’s waist. Baekhyun sputters and plants a hand against his face in an attempt to get free, and Jongdae laughs at their noisy scuffling until Chanyeol’s other monkey arm swings out to pull him in too. 

Somehow he ends up with his face crushed into Chanyeol’s armpit and one of Baekhyun’s elbows digging into his diaphragm. “You’re too big for this, Park,” Baekhyun mumbles, voice muffled by Chanyeol’s bicep. Jongdae grunts in agreement.

Baekhyun is the first to finally struggle free (he jams a knee up into Chanyeol’s gut and Chanyeol doubles over with a sputter, wheezing something about aim and height advantages). He then makes his way over to the stove despite his earlier complaints, and while he bangs around for a skillet Jongdae goes back to the counter and pulls out the chair next to him for Chanyeol. Chanyeol’s a little too tall for sitting at the countertop and his knees knock up against the underside of the granite when he sits down.

Jongdae pops a handful of trail mix into his mouth. “Were you in town for a job?” he asks around a mouthful of nuts and granola, nodding at the rifle Chanyeol’s propped against the wall.

“Just finished one, actually,” Chanyeol says. He reaches over and grabs a handful too. “It was in that park that’s ten, fifteen miles away from here? With the water fountain that looks like a dick?”

“Children play on that fountain, you predator.”

“Which is exactly why,” Chanyeol hums, not missing a beat, “I went there to take care of a banshee. To protect the kiddos.”

“Mm,” Jongdae says. “Not because you were hired to do it.”

“Pinnacle of charity and altruistic intention, I am.”

“Keep thinking that, Yoda.”

“A banshee?” Baekhyun asks loudly from the stove. He’s turned the stove vent on and he has to raise his voice to be heard over the low roar of the fan. “Did you say a _banshee?”_

“Yes, Baekhyun, and even her banshee ass was quieter than you,” Chanyeol says back, just as loud. Jongdae chokes on a raisin with a snort and ends up almost coughing a lung out laughing, which makes Baekhyun shoot an evil look over his shoulder while he continues scrambling the eggs.

“Anyway,” Chanyeol says, hitting Jongdae on the back a few times helpfully, “how’ve you been? Haven’t been around here in a while.”

Chanyeol’s been friends with them for three years now. How they met is good story for spilling over a few beers (it involved a motorcycle and a lost beagle) but the most important thing is that he’s a hunter, too. He lives far away enough to be under the jurisdiction of a different branch of the hunting association, though, which means any time a job sends him into the area he takes it upon himself to crash at their apartment instead of making the drive back.

In the time it takes Jongdae to think about this he manages to stop choking on the raisin. “Fine,” he manages with a last wheeze. “Got a job that’s taking some time to investigate.”

Chanyeol snorts. “Is that what the cliché red string-map’s about?”

“Baekhyun’s idea,” Jongdae mutters, and Chanyeol gets up with a barely-suppressed grin to look closer at the living room wall.

Baekhyun finishes while Chanyeol’s still squinting at the pictures. He ambles over to the counter with the skillet and starts to tip the scrambled eggs onto a plate with one hand, other hand picking through the bowl of trail mix for the chocolate pieces. Four years of Baekhyun eating nothing but the chocolate chips in trail mix means Jongdae pulls a face at him but doesn’t bother batting him away. Baekhyun pulls a face back. _Life-partners,_ the evil Jongin-voice that’s taken residence in his head singsongs.

“Hey,” Chanyeol calls suddenly from the living room, “are these the new apartments they’re building on 6th street?”

“Yeah,” Baekhyun hums, not looking away from his multitasking. “Eggs are ready.”

“What’s the ‘Kyungsoo’ sticky note mean?”

Baekhyun blinks and looks up, obviously surprised by the subject change. Jongdae’s surprised, too, if only because Chanyeol never passes up an opportunity to jump on Baekhyun’s scrambled eggs.

“Um,” Baekhyun says. He glances at Jongdae. “Part of the job we’re working right now, why?”

“I think,” Chanyeol says slowly, turning away from the wall, “I know him.”

 

 

 

 

 

An hour later, they’re barging into the unit of Yixing’s apartments that they originally found Jongin in, Jongdae’s cellphone glued to his ear as he listens to Chanyeol stampede with similar noisiness but considerably more clumsiness through the hallways of some other apartment on the other side of town.

Baekhyun is the one to throw the door open. “We found for your boyfriend, Jongin!” he exclaims, loud enough to shake the just-built rafters, and Jongin, standing in the kitchen again, leaps a foot in the air.

“Oh my god,” Jongdae groans. “When will you grasp the concept of subtlety.” Through the cellphone speaker, Chanyeol lets out a crackle of laughter.

“Kyungsoo,” Baekhyun presses, leaning forward eagerly. “Kyungsoo, your boyfriend, right?”

Jongin gapes at him. “Yes?”

In his ear, Jongdae hears the sound of Chanyeol hammering insistently on a door. A second later, there’s the squeak of it opening, Chanyeol saying _“just take it”_ to someone on the other line, and fumbling sound of the phone being pressed into someone else’s hands.

He takes the phone away from his ear and switches it to speakerphone.

“Chanyeol, what—” says someone’s voice, and Jongin, if possible, goes completely white.

More staticky fumbling, before the person finally comes back on the line with a wary and exasperated “Hello?”

Jongin stares at the cellphone, then at them, a glimmer of something fragile and hopeful and astonished in his eyes. Baekhyun grins at him encouragingly and Jongdae tries to keep his own hand from shaking.

“Kyungsoo?” Jongin says hoarsely into the quiet.

The line goes silent.

“Kyungsoo?” Jongin repeats, a little louder. “Kyungsoo, is that you?”

“Who is this,” the person says, voice dusted with disbelief, and Jongin cuts off. “Chanyeol, who is this, it can’t—it’s not—he _died_ four years ago.”

A low laugh. Chanyeol’s voice. “There’s a supernatural hunter standing right in front of you. Ghosts exist, hey.”

Another long silence, then: “ _Jongin?”_ The voice is a little breathless and filled with the same incredulous hope that’s in Jongin’s eyes.

“Oh my god, Kyungsoo—”

Jongdae sets the phone on the table and leaves the apartment with Baekhyun. It’s not their conversation to have.

 

 

This is how it goes:

Chanyeol turns away from red string-map tacked on their living room wall and says he knows a Kyungsoo. (“He lives in the same complex that I do, a few doors down. I haven’t talked to him more than the few times we’ve went to get our mail at the same time, but I know he used to live on 6th street before his house got burned down in the fire.”)

Baekhyun drops the skillet in excitement and Jongdae almost trips and breaks his knee in his haste to bolt up out of his chair.

They spill the pieces of the Grand Ghost Job that they have so far to Chanyeol while they’re running down to the parking lot, and Chanyeol nods and hems and haws, making noises of agreement. (“Kyungsoo always seems kinda sad. I mean, that might just be him being Kyungsoo, but now it makes sense why.”)

So while Jongdae and Baekhyun speed their way to Yixing’s apartments, Chanyeol scoops Baekhyun’s scrambled eggs into a tupperware, climbs back into his jeep, and hightails it across town back to his own apartment complex.

At six PM, on a Saturday night, Do Kyungsoo and Kim Jongin speak to each other for the first time in four years.

Jongdae and Baekhyun, sitting out on the curb outside the apartments, watch as Chanyeol’s jeep slides into the lot ten minutes later and a young man with big eyes and a huge heart-shaped smile, phone pressed to his ear, bursts out of the passenger side and rushes up the steps into the unit they just left. Chanyeol moseys over slower and sits on the curb with them, still eating eggs out of a container with a plastic fork.

Jongdae hooks his chin over Baekhyun’s shoulder and glances at Chanyeol. (“Hey, thanks. You saved our asses on this job.” “’S just repayment for the eggs.”)

Chanyeol soon heads over to the convenience store a few blocks away for a beer and Jongdae and Baekhyun are left by themselves.

The cool night air skims across Jongdae’s skin. It makes him feel weirdly brave, like some windy spirit is patting him on the cheeks and telling him to make something happen. He thinks about Jongin and Kyungsoo and then thinks about the warm press of Baekhyun against his side and falling asleep with Baekhyun on the couch and thinks, _yeah_. Maybe he should.

“Hey,” he says.

Baekhyun turns to him. His eyes are bright in the low light coming from the apartments behind them and his cheeks are flushed from the cold; he looks exactly how he’s looked a million other times before but something about tonight makes him seem radiant in the darkness. Christ, Jongdae’s _fucked._ He’s fucked and it’s taken him four years to realize.

Whatever he was about to say gets stuck in his throat.

Baekhyun waits, watching him patiently. Baekhyun’s never patient about goddamn anything, though, Jongdae thinks, and for a wild unthinking second he tips forward a little, letting their already-close heads list even closer.

Then he’s pulling back, wondering what the fuck he’s doing, and—

“What the hell, Dae, I thought you were going in for a kiss.”

See, never patient about goddamn anything—

What.

“It’s cold,” Baekhyun gripes, “and sitting on a concrete curb is really uncomfortable, so if you’re going for a kiss do it _now_ before I freeze my ass off.” He pauses, mouth twisting a little. “I mean. If you want.”

“I can’t believe you,” Jongdae huffs after a few beats. “You’re a piece of shit, Baekhyun, you know that?”

Baekhyun grins, and Jongdae kisses him.

 

 

 

 

 

Chanyeol comes back five minutes later to them holding hands. All he does is roll his eyes and mutter, “Finally. Congrats. Gross.”

 

 

 

 

 

A few weeks later, at the grand opening of Yixing’s apartments, Jongdae asks Yixing why he asked for them specifically when he was looking for hunters.

“Ah,” Yixing hums. “It was because of how you handled the werewolf at the Lotto Mall. I haven’t employed many hunters in the past but those that I have always kill the supernatural they’re hunting.” He frowns, brow creasing. “Very brutal, inhumane methods. Your choice of tranquilizing the wolf told me that you’d deal with the ghost boy haunting my apartments with care.”

Jongdae gapes at him. “You were that careful about it?”

“Of course.”

“Enough that you still paid us afterwards even though we didn’t get rid of the ghost?”

“Of course,” Yixing says again, smiling, as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world.

He finds Baekhyun in the crowd later and they see Kyungsoo before leaving. He’s been visiting the unit up the stairs that Jongin haunts nearly every day, to the point that he’s practically living in it already. “I’m planning on buying it soon,” he confesses to them. “Jongin’s really attached to this place, and it’s not a far drive from where I work, so moving in won’t be an issue.” Baekhyun whistles and gives him a thumbs up. Kyungsoo beams at them both.

 

 

 

 

 

Epilogue:

Minseok texts him a week after that (how Jongdae has Minseok’s number and how Minseok has his is a bit of a mystery).

_Congratulations on your last job  
You’re welcome_

Baekhyun, reading over his shoulder, scoffs and tells him to delete it.

**Author's Note:**

> i know irl bbh can’t even boil water but. for the sake of fic pretend he can make scrambled eggs


End file.
